Articles: emergency-medicine.
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COVID-19 has fundamentally changed the practice of Emergency Medicine (EM). Care delivery on the front lines has historically depended upon ostensibly reliable input-output models for staffing, supplies, policies, and therapies. Challenged by the complexity of healthcare during the pandemic, the fallibility of these reductionist models was quickly revealed. Providers and systems quickly had to reconceptualize their dependence on the wider, complex system in which healthcare operates and find adaptive solutions to rapid changes. ⋯ By integrating ST/CT into the practice of EM, we can not only improve our ability to care for patients but also our capacity to understand and strengthen our wider systems of care.
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Financial relationships between physicians and the health care industry are common in the United States. Yet, there are limited data on payments to emergency physicians since the 2014 launch of the Open Payments Database. ⋯ The majority of emergency physicians received payments from the health care industry, although these payments were typically minimal compared with other specialties. Payment trends remained consistent from 2014 to 2019, with a notable decrease in 2020 due to the pandemic.
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Observational Study
An Outbreak of Home Distillation Methanol Poisoning in Turkey During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Single Center Experience.
Causes of methanol poisoning may include accidental or suicidal use, as well as self home-distillation. In this study, it was aimed to evaluate clinical characteristics, laboratory findings, and outcomes of home-distillation methanol poisoning in two different time periods as an outbreak during the pandemic. The source of the methanol poisoning in all patients was home-brewing or distillation of methanol. ⋯ In methanol poisoning due to home brewing, low blood pressure, oxygen saturation, and impaired consciousness at the time of admission were clinical findings associated with mortality. In terms of laboratory findings, especially severe metabolic acidosis and lactate elevation were observed in the group that was mortal despite treatment.